Top 20 Movies of All Time

(According to Metacritic)

  1. Lawrence of Arabia

    100

    Follows a brilliant, flamboyant and controversial British military figure and his conflicted loyalties during wartime service.

  2. Fanny and Alexander

    100

    Two young Swedish children experience the many comedies and tragedies of their family, the Ekdahls.

  3. The Leopard

    100

    The Prince of Salina, a noble aristocrat of impeccable integrity, tries to preserve his family and class amid the tumultuous social upheavals of 1860's Sicily.

  4. Best Kept Secret

    100

    JFK High School, located in the midst of a run-down area in Newark, New Jersey, is a public school for all types of students with special education needs, ranging from those on the autism ...

  5. The Wizard of Oz

    100

    Dorothy Gale is swept away to a magical land in a tornado and embarks on a quest to see the Wizard who can help her return home.

  6. The Conformist

    100

    A weak-willed Italian man becomes a fascist flunky who goes abroad to arrange the assassination of his old teacher, now a political dissident.

  7. Boyhood

    100

    The life of Mason, from early childhood to his arrival at college.

  8. The Godfather

    100

    The aging patriarch of an organized crime dynasty transfers control of his clandestine empire to his reluctant son.

  9. The Night of the Hunter

    99

    A religious fanatic marries a gullible widow whose young children are reluctant to tell him where their real daddy hid $10,000 he'd stolen in a robbery.

  10. Pan's Labyrinth

    98

    In the falangist Spain of 1944, the bookish young stepdaughter of a sadistic army officer escapes into an eerie but captivating fantasy world.

  11. Carol

    98

    Set in 1950s New York, a department-store clerk who dreams of a better life falls for an older, married woman.

  12. Hoop Dreams

    98

    A film following the lives of two inner-city Chicago boys who struggle to become college basketball players on the road to going professional.

  13. The Producers

    97

    Producers Max Bialystock and Leo Bloom make money by producing a sure-fire flop.

  14. 12 Years a Slave

    97

    In the antebellum United States, Solomon Northup, a free black man from upstate New York, is abducted and sold into slavery.

  15. The Adventures of Robin Hood

    97

    When Prince John and the Norman Lords begin oppressing the Saxon masses in King Richard's absence, a Saxon lord fights back as the outlaw leader of a rebel guerrilla army.

  16. The Adventures of Robin Hood

    97

    When Prince John and the Norman Lords begin oppressing the Saxon masses in King Richard's absence, a Saxon lord fights back as the outlaw leader of a rebel guerrilla army.

  17. The French Connection

    96

    A pair of NYC cops in the Narcotics Bureau stumble onto a drug smuggling job with a French connection.

  18. Ratatouille

    96

    A rat who can cook makes an unusual alliance with a young kitchen worker at a famous restaurant.

  19. Gravity

    96

    A medical engineer and an astronaut work together to survive after a catastrophe destroys their shuttle and leaves them adrift in orbit.

  20. A Hard Day's Night

    96

    A 'typical' day in the life of the Beatles, including many of their famous songs.

  21. Taxi

    96

    A day with a taxi driver in Teheran.

  22. Gravity

    96

    A medical engineer and an astronaut work together to survive after a catastrophe destroys their shuttle and leaves them adrift in orbit.

  23. Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb

    96

    An insane general triggers a path to nuclear holocaust that a war room full of politicians and generals frantically try to stop.

  24. Modern Times

    96

    The Tramp struggles to live in modern industrial society with the help of a young homeless woman.

  25. The Social Network

    95

    Harvard student Mark Zuckerberg creates the social networking site that would become known as Facebook, but is later sued by two brothers who claimed he stole their idea, and the cofounder who was later squeezed out of the business.

  26. Zero Dark Thirty

    95

    A chronicle of the decade-long hunt for al-Qaeda terrorist leader Osama bin Laden after the September 2001 attacks, and his death at the hands of the Navy S.E.A.L.s Team 6 in May 2011.

  27. A Separation

    95

    A married couple are faced with a difficult decision - to improve the life of their child by moving to another country or to stay in Iran and look after a deteriorating parent who has Alzheimer's disease.

  28. Mr. Turner

    94

    An exploration of the last quarter century of the great, if eccentric, British painter J.M.W. Turner's life.

  29. We Were Here

    94

    A deep and reflective look at the arrival and impact of AIDS in San Francisco and how individuals rose to the occasion during the first years of this unimaginable crisis.

  30. Amour

    94

    Georges and Anne are an octogenarian couple. They are cultivated, retired music teachers. Their daughter, also a musician, lives in Britain with her family. One day, Anne has a stroke, and the couple's bond of love is severely tested.

  31. First Cousin Once Removed

    94

    Acclaimed filmmaker Alan Berliner chronicles the deeply personal story of his mother's first cousin--well-known poet/translator/professor Edwin Honig--on his journey into the depths of ...

  32. Amour

    94

    Georges and Anne are an octogenarian couple. They are cultivated, retired music teachers. Their daughter, also a musician, lives in Britain with her family. One day, Anne has a stroke, and the couple's bond of love is severely tested.

  33. The Hurt Locker

    94

    During the Iraq War, a Sergeant recently assigned to an army bomb squad is put at odds with his squad mates due to his maverick way of handling his work.

  34. Killer of Sheep

    94

    Stan works in drudgery at a slaughterhouse. His personal life is drab. Dissatisfaction and ennui keep him unresponsive to the needs of his adoring wife, and he must struggle against ...

  35. Pulp Fiction

    94

    The lives of two mob hit men, a boxer, a gangster's wife, and a pair of diner bandits intertwine in four tales of violence and redemption.

  36. WALLèE

    94

    In the distant future, a small waste collecting robot inadvertently embarks on a space journey that will ultimately decide the fate of mankind.

  37. Spirited Away

    94

    During her family's move to the suburbs, a sullen 10-year-old girl wanders into a world ruled by gods, witches, and spirits, and where humans are changed into beasts.

  38. The Manchurian Candidate

    94

    A former Korean War POW is brainwashed by Communists into becoming a political assassin. But another former prisoner may know how to save him.

  39. Before Midnight

    94

    We meet Jesse and Celine nine years on in Greece. Almost two decades have passed since their first meeting on that train bound for Vienna.

  40. E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial

    94

    A troubled child summons the courage to help a friendly alien escape Earth and return to his home-world.

  41. Sideways

    94

    Two men reaching middle age with not much to show but disappointment, embark on a week long road trip through California's wine country, just as one is about to take a trip down the aisle.

  42. Inside Out

    94

    After young Riley is uprooted from her Midwest life and moved to San Francisco, her emotions - Joy, Fear, Anger, Disgust and Sadness - conflict on how best to navigate a new city, house, and school.

  43. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

    94

    Gandalf and Aragorn lead the World of Men against Sauron's army to draw his gaze from Frodo and Sam as they approach Mount Doom with the One Ring.

  44. Crumb

    93

    An intimate portrait of the controversial cartoonist and his traumatized family.

  45. Taxi Driver

    93

    A mentally unstable Vietnam war veteran works as a night-time taxi driver in New York City where the perceived decadence and sleaze feeds his urge for violent action, attempting to save a preadolescent prostitute in the process.

  46. Days of Heaven

    93

    A hot-tempered farm laborer convinces the woman he loves to marry their rich but dying boss so that they can have a claim to his fortune.

  47. Reversal of Fortune

    93

    Wealthy Sunny von Bèlow lies brain-dead, husband Claus guilty of attempted murder; but he says he's innocent and hires Alan Dershowitz for his appeal.

  48. The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie

    93

    A surreal, virtually plotless series of dreams centered around six middle-class people and their consistently interrupted attempts to have a meal together.

  49. Tristana

    93

    When the young woman Tristana's mother dies, she is entrusted to the guardianship of the well-respected though old Don Lope. Don Lope is well-liked and well-known because of his honorable ...

  50. Gideon's Army

    93

    Follows three young, committed Public Defenders who are dedicated to working for the people society would rather forget. Long hours, low pay and staggering caseloads are so common that even the most committed often give up.

  51. Schindler's List

    93

    In Poland during World War II, Oskar Schindler gradually becomes concerned for his Jewish workforce after witnessing their persecution by the Nazis.

  52. Amadeus

    93

    The incredible story of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, told by his peer and secret rival Antonio Salieri - now confined to an insane asylum.

  53. Sita Sings the Blues

    93

    An animated version of the epic Indian tale of Ramayana set to the 1920s jazz vocals of Annette Hanshaw.

  54. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon

    93

    Two warriors in pursuit of a stolen sword and a notorious fugitive are led to an impetuous, physically skilled, adolescent nobleman's daughter, who is at a crossroads in her life.

  55. Raging Bull

    92

    An emotionally self-destructive boxer's journey through life, as the violence and temper that leads him to the top in the ring, destroys his life outside it.

  56. Werckmeister Harmonies

    92

    This story takes place in a small town on the Hungarian Plain. In a provincial town, which is surrounded with nothing else but frost. It is bitterly cold weather - without snow. Even in ...

  57. Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope

    92

    Luke Skywalker joins forces with a Jedi Knight, a cocky pilot, a wookiee and two droids to save the universe from the Empire's world-destroying battle-station, while also attempting to rescue Princess Leia from the evil Darth Vader.

  58. There Will Be Blood

    92

    A story of family, religion, hatred, oil and madness, focusing on a turn-of-the-century prospector in the early days of the business.

  59. Phoenix

    92

    A disfigured concentration-camp survivor (Nina Hoss), unrecognizable after facial reconstruction surgery, searches ravaged postwar Berlin for the husband (Ronald Zehrfeld) who might have betrayed her to the Nazis.

  60. Inside Llewyn Davis

    92

    A week in the life of a young singer as he navigates the Greenwich Village folk scene of 1961.

  61. Leviathan

    92

    In a Russian coastal town, Kolya is forced to fight the corrupt mayor when he is told that his house will be demolished. He recruits a lawyer friend to help, but the man's arrival brings further misfortune for Kolya and his family.

  62. The Look of Silence

    92

    A family that survives the genocide in Indonesia confronts the men who killed one of their brothers.

  63. The Diving Bell and the Butterfly

    92

    The true story of Elle editor Jean-Dominique Bauby who suffers a stroke and has to live with an almost totally paralyzed body; only his left eye isn't paralyzed.

  64. A Man Vanishes

    92

  65. Toy Story

    92

    A cowboy doll is profoundly threatened and jealous when a new spaceman figure supplants him as top toy in a boy's room.

  66. Toy Story 3

    92

    The toys are mistakenly delivered to a day-care center instead of the attic right before Andy leaves for college, and it's up to Woody to convince the other toys that they weren't abandoned and to return home.

  67. The Class

    92

    Teacher and novelist Franèois Bègaudeau plays a version of himself as he negotiates a year with his racially mixed students from a tough Parisian neighborhood.

  68. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring

    92

    A meek hobbit of the Shire and eight companions set out on a journey to Mount Doom to destroy the One Ring and the dark lord Sauron.

  69. A Summer's Tale

    91

    A shy maths graduate takes a holiday in Dinard before starting his first job. He hopes his sort-of girlfriend will join him, but soon strikes up a friendship with another girl working in ...

  70. No Country for Old Men

    91

    Violence and mayhem ensue after a hunter stumbles upon a drug deal gone wrong and more than two million dollars in cash near the Rio Grande.

  71. Timbuktu

    91

    A cattle herder and his family who reside in the dunes of Timbuktu find their quiet lives -- which are typically free of the Jihadists determined to control their faith -- abruptly disturbed.

  72. Do the Right Thing

    91

    On the hottest day of the year on a street in the Bedford-Stuyvesant section of Brooklyn, everyone's hate and bigotry smolders and builds until it explodes into violence.

  73. The Queen

    91

    After the death of Princess Diana, Queen Elizabeth II struggles with her reaction to a sequence of events nobody could have predicted.

  74. Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner

    91

    The telling of an Inuit legend of an evil spirit causing strife in the community and one warrior's endurance and battle of its menace.

  75. Secrets & Lies

    91

    A successful black woman discovers that her birth mother is a lower-class white woman, but the woman denies it. As emotions run high, everyone's secrets are exposed.

  76. Patton

    91

    The World War II phase of the career of the controversial American general, George S. Patton.

  77. Close Encounters of the Third Kind

    91

    After an encounter with U.F.O.s, a line worker feels undeniably drawn to an isolated area in the wilderness where something spectacular is about to happen.

  78. Ida

    91

    Anna, a young novitiate nun in 1960s Poland, is on the verge of taking her vows when she discovers a dark family secret dating back to the years of the Nazi occupation.

  79. The Gatekeepers

    91

    A documentary featuring interviews with all surviving former heads of Shin Bet, the Israeli security agency whose activities and membership are closely held state secrets.

  80. Stories We Tell

    91

    A film that excavates layers of myth and memory to find the elusive truth at the core of a family of storytellers.

  81. Waltz with Bashir

    91

    An Israeli film director interviews fellow veterans of the 1982 invasion of Lebanon to reconstruct his own memories of his term of service in that conflict.

  82. The Triplets of Belleville

    91

    When her grandson is kidnapped during the Tour de France, Madame Souza and her beloved pooch Bruno team up with the Belleville Sisters--an aged song-and-dance team from the days of Fred Astaire--to rescue him.

  83. Bloody Sunday

    90

    A dramatization of the Irish civil rights protest march and subsequent massacre by British troops on January 30, 1972.

  84. L.A. Confidential

    90

    As corruption grows in 1950s LA, three policemen - one strait-laced, one brutal, and one sleazy - investigate a series of murders with their own brand of justice.

  85. Finding Nemo

    90

    After his son is captured in the Great Barrier Reef and taken to Sydney, a timid clownfish sets out on a journey to bring him home.

  86. United 93

    90

    A real time account of the events on United Flight 93, one of the planes hijacked on 9/11 that crashed near Shanksville, Pennsylvania when passengers foiled the terrorist plot.

  87. Bloody Sunday

    90

    A dramatization of the Irish civil rights protest march and subsequent massacre by British troops on January 30, 1972.

  88. Persepolis

    90

    Poignant coming-of-age story of a precocious and outspoken young Iranian girl that begins during the Islamic Revolution.

  89. Topsy-Turvy

    90

    After Gilbert and Sullivan's latest play is critically panned, the frustrated team threatens to disband until it is inspired to write the masterpiece "The Mikado."

  90. After Hours

    90

    An ordinary word processor has the worst night of his life after he agrees to visit a girl in Soho whom he met that evening at a coffee shop.

  91. Hannah and Her Sisters

    90

    Between two Thanksgivings, Hannah's husband falls in love with her sister Lee, while her hypochondriac ex-husband rekindles his relationship with her sister Holly.

  92. The Passenger

    90

    A frustrated war correspondent, unable to find the war he's been asked to cover, takes the risky path of co-opting the I.D. of a dead arms dealer acquaintance.

  93. Apocalypse Now

    90

    During the Vietnam War, Captain Willard is sent on a dangerous mission into Cambodia to assassinate a renegade colonel who has set himself up as a god among a local tribe.

  94. Gosford Park

    90

    The lives of upstairs guest and downstairs servants at a party in 1932 in a country house in England as they investigate a murder involving one of them.

  95. La Commune (Paris, 1871)

    90

    In this war drama blurring the lines between documentary and fiction, the working class and the bourgeoisie of 19th century Paris are interviewed and covered on television, before and during a tragic workers' class revolt.

  96. The Crying Game

    90

    A British soldier is kidnapped by IRA terrorists. He befriends one of his captors, who is drawn into the soldier's world.

  97. Saving Private Ryan

    90

    Following the Normandy Landings, a group of U.S. soldiers go behind enemy lines to retrieve a paratrooper whose brothers have been killed in action.

  98. Before Sunset

    90

    Nine years after Jesse and Celine first met, they encounter each other again on the French leg of Jesse's book tour.

  99. Raiders of the Lost Ark

    90

    Archaeologist and adventurer Indiana Jones is hired by the US government to find the Ark of the Covenant before the Nazis.

  100. American Splendor

    90

    An original mix of fiction and reality illuminates the life of comic book hero everyman Harvey Pekar.